At the battle of Hochkirchen, which was fought on the 13th October, the defeat of the Prussians was solely attributed to Loudon's skill and bravery. On the 12th he had attacked a great convoy, but was repulsed by Marshal the Honourable James Keith, with the loss of eighty men, among whom was the Prince de Lichenstien, lieutenant-colonel of the regiment of Loewenstien. After this Loudon assembled his dispersed troops and took ground in a woody mountain, which was a long quarter of a league, German measure, beyond the Prussian right, facing the village of Hochkirchen. A marsh separated the flank of Frederick from this height. Daun secretly prepared a road for four columns to form a junction with Loudon, who on the night of the 13th glided down with his swift Pandours to the rear of the Prussian position, and set on fire the village of Hochkirchen, driving out by the edge of the sabre the battalions quartered there, and seizing on a battery which defended an angle of the place; while the gallant Major Lang, with the regiment of the Margrave Charles, threw himself into the churchyard, and in the dark opened a blaze of musketry on the Pandours, whose light uniforms were soon too fatally visible by the flames of the burning village. Around this conflagration the whole tide of battle rolled at midnight. The aged Marshal Keith and Prince Ferdinand of Brunswick were killed, and the Prussians were defeated with the loss of seven thousand men and most of their camp equipage. Marshal Daun filled his despatch (which detailed this victory) with the highest encomiums on Loudon, whom he sent immediately towards Silesia in pursuit of Frederick, whose forces he was to exclude from Lusatia; and so he followed and galled them with untiring zeal and vigour, though he was then suffering from a severe and chronic disease in the stomach; but on his march towards the Saxon capital, the Prussian monarch made one vigorous stand and repulsed him; after which he retired to Zittau. Reinforced by 12,000 men, the marshal concealed himself in the forest of Schonberg, where he again attacked the Prussians, whose whole line of march became "one battle;" but Prince Henry, Frederick's brother, commanded the rear-guard; and so excellent were his dispositions, that only Lieutenant-General Bulow and 215 soldiers fell.